marriage break up and sale of house

boredwithhubby

this is my first post so hopefully it is the right place.

I want to split up with my husband and therefore we need to sell our house. I just need some advice on how to split the proceeds. when I met him I had owned my own house for 10 years with a tiny mortgage...£33000 to be precise. he moved in and 3 years later I sold the house for £175000 and we bought a new house for £205000 . we paid off some credit card loans etc and our new joint mortgage was £97000. so effecitvely you could say that I put down a deposit of £108000.

as we all know house prices have fallen down and at a rough guess our house is now worth £180000 and our mortgage currently stands at approx £93000. so after it is paid off we would have £87000. How much of this should I offer to my husband, taking into account that all the equity was made on the first house which was mine and in fact on the second house we have lost £21000.

please help me get my head around this as I have a figure in mind and need to know if it is fair.

chris_m

Did he put anything into the old house (eg paying mortgage) during the three years until you sold it which could give him any claim for part of the proceeds from that?

boredwithhubby

he paid £2000 for some work that needed doing and he paid a small amount of rent and bills.

hcb42

not very much....but of course the question is a lot broader than that in marriage.

did you agree to anything when you bought this new house? who has paid the mortgage, do you earn similar salaries? Lots of scenarios here...

boredwithhubby

we had a verbal agreement that he wouldnt ever try to fleece me. we have both paid the mortage, he earns more than me but that is because I work part time as we have 2 children. although all the household bills and mortgage have always been split down the middle but he paid for the shopping and petrol etc

PasturesNew

"... with all my worldy goods I thee endow..."

taxsaver

My understanding is that a lot depends on how long you have been married. Different rules apply to 'short marriages' (under six years) than to longer ones. In the former the general aim is to (as near as is possible) put both parties back into the same position that they were in before the marriage. Many more issues come into play with longer marriages and ofc you will have the issue of the children, which also impact on any financial agreement.

boredwithhubby

PasturesNew wrote: »

"... with all my worldy goods I thee endow..."

so what...I should just hand it all over to him and leave myself and our 2 kids high and dry?!!

boredwithhubby

taxsaver wrote: »

My understanding is that a lot depends on how long you have been married. Different rules apply to 'short marriages' (under six years) than to longer ones. In the former the general aim is to (as near as is possible) put both parties back into the same position that they were in before the marriage. Many more issues come into play with longer marriages and ofc you will have the issue of the children, which also impact on any financial agreement.

we have been married 6 years and have 2 children who will live with me although they will be with him 2 nights a week. before the marriage he had nothing and I had a house with over £100000 of equity. I am happy to give him something but taking all that into account and the fact that we have collectivley lost £25000 on our house I was thinking that £10000 would be more than fair?

Egg_custard_2

When I bought my current house jointly with hubby, I put down the proceeds of the sale of my previous solely owned house as deposit. My solicitors said I would need to have a signed document stating that the previous house proceeds were mine and not to be shared if I didn't want my hubby to have a claim if we were to separate. I made no such document and we (like you) verbally agreed that he would not shaft me.

Legally I have no comeback if that situation arose. Likewise I doubt you do, unless you made a written agreement (I assume you didn't). If he wanted to play hardball, your hubby's solicitors could probably make a case for him receiving a larger share than the £10k you are suggesting. However, if the two of you can come to an agreement it doesn't need to come down to legalities and hopefully he will honour his verbal agreement.

Seanymph

Don't offer him anything.

What you need to do is get yourself a good solicitor and let THEM decide a good figure.

You will have the children to raise, your ability to work will be impacted beyond recognition as a single parent, and your husband may well be financially supportive initially but with exceptionally rare exceptions as soon as he is in another relationship and/or supporting other or having more children his priorities will change. NOW is the time you have to protect you and the children to give yourselves some financial security.

If necessary take more capital now as a trade for less maintenance later - money in the bank is worth far more than promises. I have lost count of the number of people I know who hand it over with the promise of healthy maintenance and then face ever decreasing monthly amounts - but without the ability to reduce their outgoings. Eventually the people who suffer is always the children who end up missing out on clubs/school trips and the like.

you are obviously financially astute, don't let 'doing the right thing' or 'being seen to be fair' blinker you to protecting your and your children's future.

Get a solicitor, take advice, and let THEM negotiate.